Dan Kildee: “I thank my friend and colleague, the ranking member, for yielding and for her work on behalf of my hometown of Flint.…”

“I thank my friend and colleague, the ranking member, for yielding and for her work on behalf of my hometown of Flint. She has been one of the strong advocates. Mr. Speaker, no piece of legislation that I have yet seen in the 4 years I have been in Congress and that has come before this floor is perfect, and this bill is included; but the people of Flint today--the people of my hometown--cannot drink their water because of actions by the State government and, frankly, as we know, because of the failure of the Federal Government, through the EPA, to alert the citizens of Flint to the crisis. The fact that their water had been poisoned has caused this community to face the biggest crisis that it has faced in all of its years. {time} 1315 I am a product of Flint, Michigan. I grew up in Flint. Everything I have, everything I am, I owe to that community--and it has faced some terrible struggles over the years: the loss of manufacturing jobs, 90 percent of those manufacturing jobs are gone; the loss of half of its population, blight and abandonment. It is a community that had just begun to rebuild itself when this water crisis caused Flint to face the toughest times it has ever faced. It needs every level of government to step up to provide relief. This bill includes necessary funding to put Flint back on a path that allows its citizens to have the basic human right of clean drinking water.…”